We have been working for over 2 years on the design submittal of a very large LEED CS office tower, but the lease area has always been somewhat unclear and now, only a few weeks away from completing the Design Stage submittal, the owner won't confirm the area that will be let. The building is under construction now but is several years away from completion. There are internal reasons to submit as-is under CS . What is the worst-case scenario if we submit now, under CS, but showing a truthful estimation that the leasable space is more than 60% owner-occupied (including non-leasable space it will be closer to 90% owner controlled)? Will the reviewers refuse to review it as CS at all, and require us to switch to NC? Or will they let us carry on and require us to resolve everything at a later stage? Does anyone has experience of reviewers refusing because the project is under the wrong certification system? Does anyone have experience of switching systems after a successful design stage submittal?
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Tristan Roberts
RepresentativeVermont House of Representatives
LEEDuser Expert
11474 thumbs up
May 26, 2014 - 3:11 pm
Melissa, I haven't heard of a case where GBCI refused to review based on it being the wrong rating system, which isn't to say that it hasn't happened.I would recommend contacting GBCI to get their take on the situation—just be honest and clear about what you need. I would not want to guess wrong on this and then have them go in a different direction.
Melissa Merryweather
DirectorGreen Consult-Asia
245 thumbs up
May 26, 2014 - 7:56 pm
Thanks Tristan, I do think thats the right thing to do as well. Its probably a formal enquiry question rather than a telephone call. I'll put their reply on this post when I hear back, for information purposes.
Melissa Merryweather
DirectorGreen Consult-Asia
245 thumbs up
June 14, 2014 - 4:45 am
I did receive a reply and it was definitive. They advised me to switch systems before submitting for Design Review (though no comment was offered on what would happen if we switched afterwards.) There was also no comment on what the exact protocol would be if we DID submit under the wrong system. The replier clarified that between NC and CS it is about the percentage of finished space under control of the owner, not the percentage of leased space; although I knew that, somehow having this emphasised did remove any trace of doubt (in our project the two areas would be quite different). They also said that IF the owner was scheduled to occupy a portion in the future, but that this was not fitted out at the time of the rest of the project, it would be considered unfinished space and therefore could be allocated to the non-owner portion of the building.